


Thrill-Seekers

by atlanticslide



Series: A Series of Firsts [4]
Category: Hit the Floor (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-05
Updated: 2015-07-05
Packaged: 2018-04-07 17:16:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,557
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4271454
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/atlanticslide/pseuds/atlanticslide
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>They’re in Santa Monica, out near the water but not quite on the beach, on a path set back a bit and up a small hill so Zero can glance out every so often and look down the beach-goers lounging like lazy subjects of his royal appraise.  It’s a nice day out, sunny as ever with a good breeze coming off the ocean and pushing them along, which is why Jude had suggested the run, and despite Zero’s initial protestations, it’s not so bad being out here, breathing in the air, nodding at the occasional passerby who stops and does a double take when they see him, bumping shoulders every so often with Jude beside him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Thrill-Seekers

His feet are pounding against pavement and his breath is starting to come out in wheezing gasps, his chest burning. Jogging fucking sucks.

But he’s got the ocean on one side of him and Jude on the other, glancing over at him every so often to throw him a smile, and it keeps Zero’s feet moving. 

They’re in Santa Monica, out near the water but not quite on the beach, on a path set back a bit and up a small hill so Zero can glance out every so often and look down the beach-goers lounging like lazy subjects of his royal appraise. It’s a nice day out, sunny as ever with a good breeze coming off the ocean and pushing them along, which is why Jude had suggested the run, and despite Zero’s initial protestations, it’s not so bad being out here, breathing in the air, nodding at the occasional passerby who stops and does a double take when they see him, bumping shoulders every so often with Jude beside him.

Still, there’s only so much he can take of his chest burning, and he’s been warned to be careful about his knees this offseason - _”You’re not getting any younger,”_ the team trainer had said. _”Especially your knees.”_ \- So he slows his pace, forcing Jude to slow his (and Zero’s pretty sure Jude’s already been going slower than he would on his own, which really just pisses him off), until Zero’s trotting mildly and heaving great bursts of air.

“Okay, I gotta - I gotta stop,” he pants out, hands going up behind his head as he gulps in breaths at a rapid clip.

Jude, a few paces in front of him now, stops and jogs in pace for a moment as he looks back over his shoulder, and then turns to jog back to where Zero is standing. 

“Breathe deeply,” Jude tells him, now jogging in place right in front of Zero.

“I know how to breathe,” Zero snaps as he runs the sweatband he’s got pushed up his forearm over his forehead. “Who’s the professional athlete here?”

“I’m just saying.” Jude grins and holds up his hands, still jogging in place.

“Stop that.”

Jude keeps jogging. “It’s only been like a mile and a half.”

“ _Only,_ ” Zero spits out, dropping his hands down to rest on his hips as he paces around in place in lieu of a real cooldown. “Fuck off with that shit.”

“C’mon, I know you’ve done more than that in practice,” Jude laughs. Asshole.

“I _sprint._ I don’t run distance.” He ignores Jude’s eyeroll and wanders over to lean his forearms against the railing that sits on the edge of the steep slope setting the street up above the beach. Jude joins him a moment later, brushing his arm against Zero’s as he mimics Zero’s stance, a brief moment of contact that Zero knows was deliberate. It softens his mood. Zero jostles their elbows together in response, ostensibly just two buddies, an athlete and his agent, chilling after a run by the beach. Sweat runs down the middle of his back and the breeze sweeps in every few moments, blowing into his eyes as he watches the waves crest.

“I love the ocean,” Zero says after a long, quiet moment as they both stare out at it, apropos of nothing. Because he’s supposed to, because Jude wants him to tell more about himself. Not because he wants to, even though it comes out before he really thinks about it or means for it to.

It earns him a sideways grin from Jude. “Midwesterner born and raised but a California boy at heart, huh?” 

They’ve never really talked about Zero’s childhood - Jude hasn’t pushed on that yet, at least, even though he tends to push on everything else - but he knows that Jude knows the basics. Everyone knows the basics, the _born: Wisconsin; high school: Black River Falls; college: Michigan_. Those are the important things, the only things Zero really _wants_ people to know about his pre-career life. And he’s learned well over the years how to make sure people only know about him what he wants them to. 

He’s just not sure anymore that he doesn’t want Jude to know more. Or something. It’s all gotten a little tangled up in his head, but staring out at the ocean is soothing. Jude standing beside him, close enough that Zero can feel the heat radiating from his body is soothing. 

“You grew up around here, right?” he asks in response, deflecting the conversation away from himself. 

Jude shrugs and looks away, back out over the ocean. “A little further north, a little further inland. I always wanted to live out here when I was a kid.”

“What, for the beach?” _You wanted to be near the ocean too?_ he doesn’t ask.

“Mostly for the pier,” Jude laughs, nodding at the pier off in the distance before them stretching out over the water, the distinct circular shape of the ferris wheel rising up above it. “I always loved that rollercoaster. I mean, we didn’t come out here all that often, but…”

“You?” Zero says with deliberate exaggeration in his tone. “Rollercoasters? Never really took you for the thrill-seeker type.” 

Which, yeah, considering their relationship, or whatever this thing between them is and especially how it started, isn’t _exactly_ true, but still, even if Jude practically dared Zero to kiss him, even if they’re carrying on with something that could land them both in some serious hot water if found out (and Zero has to stop that train of thought right there, because it so happens that he definitely _is_ a thrill-seeker, especially when it comes to sex, and standing out in the open in the middle of the sidewalk is not the place to be thinking about how _illicit_ and _dangerous_ their relationship is…), even if Jude’s lied and cheated and bought drugs and _distributed_ drugs, he’s always seemed like a nervous guy by nature. Someone who doesn’t necessarily seek out risky adventures, but takes them on when they’re presented to him. Which, if he’s honest with himself, is one of the things that attracts Zero.

“Yeah, I don’t think that rollercoaster is exactly what you’d call _risky_ ,” Jude tells him. Zero’s never actually been out to the pier, so he has no idea.

“So why don’t you get a place out here now?” Zero asks him, turning to lean his hip against the railing so he can look at Jude. The ferris wheel peeks up from behind Jude’s shoulder, off in the distance.

“Right,” Jude snorts. “You ever checked out the real estate prices around here? I’d need about eight more clients and a decade’s worth of savings before I could afford a closet in this area.”

Zero shrugs and turns back to the ocean. It kind of makes him want to buy Jude a house or something, and he almost offers as much, but he keeps his mouth shut. A car is one thing; a house is a little much.

“‘Scuse me?” a voice interrupts from behind them, and Zero turns to find a couple of guys behind them, youngish and staring at him eagerly. “Oh, dude, I told you!” one of them, a little taller with a pair of sunglasses pushed up on top of his blonde hair, says to the other, elbowing him in the side. “Told you it was him!” 

“Oh man,” the other guy, darker hair and a rounder face, says as he takes a step forward and raises his hand, because pretty much everyone treats Zero like they’re old buddies. At least the fans who’ve forgotten about the hooker thing. “I’m a huge fan,” the guy says, case in point, and Zero gives him the high-five he’s so desperate for, turning on that automatic grin he’s always got in his back pocket.

“We’re _both_ huge fans,” the blonde breaks in, reaching to shake Zero’s hand and holding on just a little longer than is probably necessary. The other guy, Dark-Haired Guy, is grinning like an idiot, like a kid who’s checking out his pull on Christmas morning, but this one, Blonde Guy, is staring a little darker, a little wider-eyed, his tongue is darting out to wet his lips and then he’s chewing on the corner of his mouth, and it’s just habit that Zero’s eyelids lower a bit and his grin goes wide, toothy.

“Well, thank you very much,” he says, voice dropping a little lower than normal and speaking directly to Blonde Guy, still holding onto his hand. The man is tall, broadly-built, the cut of his muscles well defined in his sleeveless t-shirt - Zero's type because pretty much everyone well-cut is his type, male or female. He watches the guy’s breathing get a little heavier, and his instinct is to make small talk for a moment, say something forgettable that Dark-Haired Guy will probably be relating as the most amazing story of his life for years, before asking Blonde Guy for a number, maybe offering to show him his car or something…

But. 

But he woke up next to Jude this morning. And he loves the way Jude smells, and he hasn’t been to his own apartment in days, and he likes making Jude smile, and he doesn’t want it to end. 

He drops Blond Guy’s hand and tries not to turn and check if Jude is pissed.

“Can we get an autograph?” Dark-Haired Guy asks eagerly, looking like he’s about to fly out of his skin.

“Sure,” Zero says, then pats his shorts automatically, ignoring the way Blonde Guy’s eyes follow the movement, and adds, “I don’t, uh, have anything to write with.”

“Here,” Jude calls from behind him, and Zero turns to find Jude fishing a black Sharpie out of the back pocket of his shorts. Zero’s a little afraid to meet his eyes, but when he does, he finds Jude looking at him sort of… sort of warmly. It makes him smile, chasing any lingering thoughts of the Blonde Guy out of his head.

“Always so prepared,” he says to Jude as Jude tosses him the marker, suddenly full of an unexpected swell of affection. Jude laughs lightly and his face goes a little red, and Zero knows he’s remembering that first night they had sex.

_“Shit,” Zero had said when he dug into the pocket of his long-discarded pants for his wallet and found there was no condom in there, which was fucking weird because he always had one on him._

_“In the dresser,” Jude breathed out heavily as he collapsed back against the mattress and ran both hands through his hair. “Top drawer.”_

_When Zero went over to look he found a box of condoms and two different types of lube, and grinned as he grabbed the box and one of the bottles of lube._

_He tossed them on the bed beside Jude and crawled up to kneel straddling Jude’s waist, leaning down to press his mouth against Jude’s. “So prepared,” he said against Jude’s lips, meaning to tease, but the words came out warm, and he was filled with such intense, aching want._

No one has anything to write on, so Zero ends up signing the guys’ t-shirts, deliberately ignoring the feel of Blonde Guy’s skin under his fingertips as Zero pulls the hem of his shirt taut. Dark-Haired Guy is babbling about the playoffs but Zero’s not really listening. 

They thank him again, high-five him again, and both guys give long, lingering looks before heading on their way. Zero turns back to Jude, now sitting perched on the railing.

Jude’s watching him with an expression that Zero can’t really read, and it makes Zero feel defensive.

“I’m trying not to do it as much,” he says, trying to stop whatever argument might be coming from Jude before it starts.

Jude just looks at him, still with that unreadable expression, calm and thoughtful, and shrugs mildly before reaching out to take the Sharpie back. “I’m trying not to get so annoyed about it,” he replies, which isn’t the same as _I’m not annoyed about it_ , but it’s something. 

So Zero nods and says, “Okay,” and comes over to lean back against the railing beside Jude.

It’s been a few weeks since the end of the playoffs, since Jude said he wanted a relationship with Zero, since Zero came to Jude’s apartment in the middle of the night, since he agreed to give it a shot, and he’s okay with things so far. Mostly. A few things nag at him sometimes - like this worry that he’s going to get bored with Jude eventually. He’s never done well with monogamy the few times he’s tried it in the past, and never really saw the point in it anyway. Jelena was a relationship of necessity, and before her there was a girl back in Ohio he hooked up with a few times, and a guy he was sleeping with for maybe a month, and another girl he dated casually last year for half the season just so he could give the press a story about his love life. Everything that could possibly be called a relationship that he’s had has ended with him getting bored and restless or someone new catching his eye, or both. 

He doesn’t want that to happen with Jude. He’s not really sure _what_ he wants to happen with Jude - it’s impossible to think about this whole relationship thing in long terms - but he does know that he doesn’t want to let go of Jude, and yet there’s this fear that at some point this isn’t going to be enough. 

This feels different from those other non-relationships, though. 

“First time I saw the ocean was when I was seventeen,” he tells Jude, because he _wants_ this to be different. “College recruiting trip, University of Miami. I was staying in some shitty dorm on campus, supposed to stay in the whole night but I got this girl from down the hall to go out to the beach with me.”

“You’re a thrill-seeker yourself,” Jude says with a hint of sarcasm, and when Zero turns to look at him, he finds Jude smiling. 

“Yeah, well, the beach was more thrilling than the girl, but at least I got to see the ocean.”

Jude laughs at that, and he seems pleased in general with this little bit of new info. Zero’s pleased that he’s pleased, and it wasn’t even so bad to talk about it.

“So why didn’t you end up going to school there?”

Zero shrugs. “Michigan offered a better scholarship. And Miami’s always sucked in the Tournament. I wanted to play for a Championship winner, make sure I got noticed by the pros.”

“Well, guess you chose well then.”

“Guess I did.” 

They look at each other for a moment and then Jude looks away, shaking his head, and again Zero can’t quite read him. It’s unsettling; he doesn’t like being so out of control of things. But Jude just nudges Zero’s shoulder with his own and nods towards the pier ahead of them. 

“C’mon,” he says, hopping down from the railing. “I want to go ride the rollercoaster.” He turns and takes off again at a jog, and all Zero can do is follow after him.


End file.
